Myanmar junta leader visits Vietnam on tour seeking international recognition

Myanmar’s junta leader Min Aung Hlaing arrived in Vietnam on Friday, continuing a carefully staged overseas tour aimed at winning recognition for the military government he heads.

A group of senior Vietnamese officials met him on the tarmac at Hanoi’s international airport, according to Khiang Khiang Soe, a spokesperson for Myanmar’s military government. During the visit, which runs through Sunday, Min Aung Hlaing is due to meet Vietnamese President To Lam, Prime Minister Le Minh Hung and National Assembly President Tran Thanh Man.

The former army chief will also attend a business forum intended to attract investment to Myanmar. The country remains mired in a deep crisis and an internal war that followed the 2021 military coup, which ended a decade of democratic transition and economic opening.

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deepens its complicity in the regime’s crimes against humanity

This is Min Aung Hlaing’s seventh foreign trip since a military-controlled parliament appointed him president in April. The appointment followed elections held in stages between December and January that faced widespread criticism and took place without opposition. Before Vietnam, he received official honors in India, China, Laos, Thailand, Russia and Belarus as his government sought to break its international isolation.

Khiang Soe told EFE that preparations were under way for a visit to Cambodia later this month. Justice For Myanmar, an activist group that received the Right Livelihood Foundation’s 2025 award, condemned Vietnam’s reception of the junta leader, saying it “deepens its complicity in the regime’s crimes against humanity.”

The group also accused Vietnam of providing financial, technological and surveillance support through Mytel, a telecommunications company owned by Vietnam’s Defense Ministry. Justice For Myanmar said Mytel built nearly 40 communications towers with companies linked to Myanmar’s military, most of them on military bases. It said the network generates financial benefits for the armed forces and supports military surveillance, including the censorship of social-media comments and the identification of opponents for arrest. UN experts said in August that the frequency and intensity of crimes against humanity and war crimes by Myanmar’s military were increasing.

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The war crimes and crimes against humanity that Myanmar’s military continues to commit receive financial, technological and surveillance support from Vietnam through Mytel.